Feelin' Good!

Anyone who knows me understands that I long to be creative. I was not given that gift. Give me a list of instructions, and I can produce results. But even with instructions, I don't generally turn out quality crafting.



That's why I'm so pleased with today's production. We got some throw pillows with our couch that I have almost always thought were hideous. But I hate spending $20+ on new pillows. So one of the websites that I follow (and imagine myself being so creative & productive) gave instructions on how to make pillow slipcovers. It sounded easy, so I did it (3 months later)! And it fit! Amazing. And since they are slipcovers, I can: a) remove them to wash in the unlikely event my children will spill milk, jelly, snot, oil, or bath wash on them; and b) theoretically make so many different kinds to fit my mood or season. Not that I think that'll happen anytime soon. But I can dream, can't I?

Free at last!

Filipe kicked me out of the house today to go grocery shopping.

As I'm pushing the cart outside, I see my shadow, and it's not pretty--my frayed stonewash jeans, boxy v-neck long-sleeved tee (navy, of course), slip-on Keds, and my lifeless locks. I'm feeling matronly and frumpish. This sucks.

So I stop by Pro-Cuts on the way home. I know, you can only expect so much from an $11.95 haircut, but after lopping off the excess hair, I feel free! I feel at least 9 months younger. Now, I need to find a $28 wardrobe makeover, and I'll be set.

The bug! The bug!

It must be going around... the sick bug. My friend Jessy has two of four kids down (at last report), and Sofia woke up last night with a fever. It's high enough to keep her from playing much, but not so high she's miserable. Which means happy day for everyone today. In our house, when someone is sick, they get to watch more TV than normal, to keep them from overexerting themselves. Which means Sam & Ben are happy campers too... Hello Clifford!

My morning

Today's happy thoughts brought to you by Ben....

Colorful Pasta with Wham

Today's lunch was brought to you by:

1 pkg. (16 oz.) tricolor spiral pasta

1 1/2 cups cubed wham

1 can (15 1/4 oz.) whole kernel corn, drained

1 1/2 cups (6 oz) shredded cheddar cheese, divided

1 can (2.8 oz) french-fried onions, divided

1 can (14 1/2 oz) vegetable broth

1 can (10 3/4 oz) condensed cream of celery soup, undiluted

1/2 cup milk

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

pepper to taste

Cook pasta according to package directions; drain. In a greased shallow 3-qt. baking dish, combine the pasta, wham, corn, 1 cup cheese and 3/4 cup onions. In a bowl, combine the broth, soup, milk and seasonings. Pour over pasta mixture; mix well.

Bake, uncovered, at 350 for 30 minutes. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and onions. Bake 5 minutes longer or until heated through. Makes 8 servings.

Book of the Week

This is a story about a mouse who lives in the library. He loves to read all kinds of books at night when the library is quiet. He finally gets inspired to write his own books, and leave them on the shelves. Everyone is curious to know who this new author is. It has such a cute ending that is supposed to inspire anyone to write a book!

Tea Time

One activity my rarely-girly-girl daughter likes to do when her brothers take a nap is play tea party. Today we had a Sabbath Tea, complete with juice & animal crackers. Living the high life!

Smells like Nirvana

The boys room smells great today. This morning, they dumped out an entire bottle of perfume on the floor. This afternoon, they try to empty a bottle of baby powder on the same floor. Do these kids have parental supervision EVER??

Simple Pleasures

There's nothing quite like getting a load of fresh-from-the-dryer cottons dumped on you on a cool day!

O! Me of Little Faith!

So in my last post I talked about how my darling boys created havoc on my previously clean kitchen floor. Then cynical, skeptical me questioned their repentance. No longer.



I now have evidence that the boys felt so bad about making my floor dirty that they turned words into actions by attempting to clean the said floor with approximately 32-loads worth of laundry detergent. You can see the sea of slime here:





So now I publically deliver my sincerest of apologies to my sons. I know you are sorry for making a mess on my clean floor. And thanks for helping to clean it again. Really.

Just another day in the life...

I mopped my kitchen floor at 11pm last night, something my dear friend Kim thought smelled a little of OCD. But it had been a while, and I have three (or four, depending on how you look at it) professional mess-makers in my house. So it really needed it. And it was nice and clean this morning, which made what happened have a good side, and a bad side.



I emerged from the laundry room to hear Sofia yell, "Mom, the boys!" which is never a good thing. She's my little watchdog. So I go three steps to the kitchen, and see the boys crouched over this:







A nearly full bag of Cheetos. I hate Cheetos. Now more than ever.



So as I mentioned, there was a good and bad side to this scenario. The good side is that I know for a fact the floor is Lysol clean. This means I will put those nasty pieces of faux cheese crunchies back in their bag where my husband will no-doubt unwittingly eat them. These are tough financial times, and that bag costs 4.99 plus tax. And I don't have to feel guilty, because the floor is actually cleaner than my counter tops right now.

Ah, yes. But the bad side. Since I will not be throwing the Cheetos away, I cannot use the broom and dustpan to remove them from my was-clean floor. So my other option looks like this:

Ugh. Did I mention my distaste for Cheetos? And to top it all off, does my son look the least bit repentant? Seriously. Is he flipping me off??

Craft Day

So I finally gave in to Sofia's plea for something to do while the brothers were sleeping, and this is what we came up with-- a caterpillar friend! Obviously, if I'm involved, it was very very simple. All it takes is an egg carton with the bottoms cut off, some paint, a pipe cleaner, and eyes. Voila! Of course, Sofia's attention span is limited, so we didn't get around to painting all the sections, but you get the idea...

You know your husband loves you when.....

He goes to a sporting goods store and thinks of you!

Birthday Girl!

Happy Belated Birthday to my firstborn! Sofia turned 4 years old on Tuesday. An eternity, and yet so fast. She's my #1 girl....

For her "party" we had my parents here, and Pastor Hunt & Audrey & her brother over to play games with her. She was in 7th Heaven!

Injured List

Poor little Benny. He was climbing up the kitchen chair to get into his booster seat (we have a counter-height table), and the whole chair fell on top of him. Seems the chair mostly fell on top of his toe. It's not a pretty sight. If you're eating right now, you might want to skip the next picture...